`Chicago Symphony: Triumph In Europe`: Tv Special A Grand Finale

For Tour

March 12, 1985|By John von Rhein, Music critic.

Nowhere do people love a winner more than in Chicago, and winning is very much the theme of ``Chicago Symphony: Triumph in Europe,`` the WBBM-Ch. 2 special that airs at 7 p.m. Tuesday, with stereo simulcast on WFMT (FM 98.7). The program, hosted by Harry Porterfield, follows conductor Georg Solti and his orchestra from Paris to Amsterdam to Brussels to London, the 11th and final stop of the CSO`s recent European tour, a tour that, in Solti`s words, reminded the world that Chicago is more than a city of mighty industry, innovative architecture and Al Capone. It`s a great performing arts center, too.

``This was the most successful tour we ever had, very rewarding,`` Solti tells Porterfield in a brief interview, taped at his London home the day after the final concert. ``I enjoyed every minute of it.``

The maestro`s enjoyment is palpable as he conducts a complete performance, taped at the tour finale Feb. 2 in London`s Royal Festival Hall, of Tchaikovsky`s Fourth Symphony. At concert`s end we see a wonderful shot of Solti ballooning his cheeks in exhausted relief before turning around to acknowledge the roaring ovation of his British subjects.

It`s a pity that the entire concert could not have been telecast in Chicago, as it was (live) in Great Britain. Still, the Tchaikovsky symphony was its high point and it fits nicely into an hour format, leaving room for an opening montage of players getting off planes and trains, instrument trunks being unloaded, reactions of European concertgoers and other offstage footage. The sponsor, Illinois Bell, is holding its commericials to the beginning and end of the performance.

Visually, the program is one of the most successful concert treatments I have seen, a tribute to the BBC-TV camera crew under Humphrey Burton`s direction. Solti`s animated podium manner, of course, well suits a medium that demands movement above all else.

Even more praiseworthy is the excellent stereo sound, which has fine separation, well-defined highs and lows and more depth than you would expect from a concert transmission. Turn up your radio (WBBM-Ch. 2 is not providing a stereo signal of its own) as high as you can without riling the neighbors.

Those of us who were in Festival Hall can attest that the excitement is no television trick but the real thing.